Liliei felt herself freeze in fear. She slowly looked behind her to see who had spoken, and the moment she saw the person, she felt a wave of relief wash over her.

The person was a rather tall Human-like woman with short green hair. She was pretty thin but as Liliei could feel, it hid an incredible strength. However the two telltale signs of who she was were her pure blue eyes, with no white or pupil, and her clothes. She wore a simple black tunic and blue pants, with the symbol of the Adventurer Guild, a sword crossed with a wand, drawn in bright blue near her shoulder.

The girl was a Receptionist, which meant that Liliei was in no danger. The Receptionist felt when she relaxed, and released her shoulder, giving her a small apologetic smile.

“Sorry for the scare, but I didn’t want you to start running if you were called.” she said as she started walking, Liliei following obediently.

“Don’t worry, I probably would have reacted like that, miss… How should I call you?”

At her question, the woman turned to her and answered with a smile. “Just call me Reig.”

“So, miss Reig, why do you want to talk to me?”

Lilian was intrigued, if a Receptionist had left the Guild Hall to talk to her, it had to be something important. After all, the Adventurer Guild wasn’t just any organization, It was created by the World Itself. Any city or village that became large enough to warrant it would someday find a Guild Hall placed somewhere near the center of the settlement. The building was indestructible and the only way it would disappear was that the place became small enough that it wasn’t useful anymore.

Going with it were the Receptionists. They were constructs made by the World to manage the Halls, appearing at the same time as the building and immortal as long as it stood. They always were two at least, but more could come if it became necessary. There were currently four in the Hall in Selqkir, the city where Liliei was living, and it was the most on the continent. The thing was that each of them had powers rivaling the greatest adventurers, even if they never made use of it. They stood neutral in every conflict and she had heard that the only moment they left their Halls was when they received direct order to do so from the World.

Which meant that the World had an interest in her, which could be good, or bad.

“We’ll be better to talk about that when inside,” said Reig while opening the door to the Hall.

Liliei looked around her, they were in the center of the city, just in front of the Guild Hall, while they hadn’t walked more than a few seconds. Right, absurdly powerful, she thought with a smirk while going through the door. The Halls were also quite peculiar. From outside they were like a simple house with a sign hanging in front which wasn’t too impressive, even with the sign enchanted so that it would always be visible from anywhere if you were searching it, even while looking in the opposite direction.

However the insides were quite different. The flooring was made of a polished black and violet stone. The walls were in a strange gray-white stone with long lines of blue that pulsed slowly. It was a lot larger than the outside would have left to guess. On her left, Liliei saw a line of tables, most with a few adventurers around, talking. On the right was a large counter made in a mix of the stone from the floor and the walls. Behind it were two other Receptionists, one a Demon-like woman whose colors tended toward orange, and the other a rather handsome Beastkin-like man – probably some feline race going by the grace in his movements. The last one was an Elf-like woman and was serving some drinks and talking with a group of adventurers.

The Guild Halls also doubled as inns of sorts, even if there were limits to prevent being oppressive for the normal inns. However one of the sticking points was that they were perfectly safe havens where everyone could enter – even if the Receptionist could ban you from entering in some cases, as long as you didn’t do something horrible, they wouldn’t. For example, they were popular for Demons adventurers when going in human land, as they weren’t exactly welcomed in the other inns – there was an old feud between them that devolved into war rather often, one actually being under way since two turns ago.

However, Reig ignored them all and went straight through to a small door near the counter which closed behind as soon as they were through. The room they were now in was pretty small in comparison to the hall, but was much more comfortable. There were two armchairs placed face to face in front of a hearth, and tapestries covered the walls. There was a small table with two glasses on it placed beside the armchairs. The Receptionist sat on one chair and waved her to the second, on which Liliei obediently sat.

She hesitated for a second if she should ask again, but then saw the woman close her eyes a second, taking a deep breath. When she opened her eyes eyes again, a frown was on her face. She then started speaking animatedly

“I don’t think you have any idea how lucky you have been young girl. That ring you stole,” Liliei was going to deny but a glare silenced her,” That ring you stole was an old artifact that was lost in the Dungeon for something like a thousand turns, and whose magic had been eroded by that of the Dungeon. I don’t know what the hell went through your head when you decided to put it on but it was nothing short of the dumbest decision you had ever made.”

Liliei was too stunned to do anything else than trying to shrink into her seat. She had heard that the Receptionists were always composed, but the one in front of her radiated anger and exasperation. And she hadn’t finished speaking yet.

“And it was quite likely to be the last as well, if it wasn’t for pure dumb luck. I mean do you know what happens when an enchantment as powerful as that is eroded?” asked Reig, before continuing without leaving Liliei time to answer “Literally anything, it exploding and taking the whole city with it was more probable than you surviving. And the effect that activated, something akin to an extreme converter from matter to mana should have killed you and a rather large part of the city. But no, because you had an incredibly rare talent that was pretty much useless except for this case and that kept you alive long enough for the World to bolster it with an Ability. And it was still dumb luck since you didn’t even do it consciously.”

By the end of the woman’s tirade, Liliei was feeling a bit nauseous. It couldn’t have been that bad could it? Well, judging by the glare the woman was sending her, it was. At least she seemed to have calmed down a little. And after closing her eyes and taking a large breath, she looked again at Liliei.

“Sorry for the outburst, but that had to come out.” Her voice was now a lot calmer, if still seeping with exasperation.

“Well, if what you say is true, not that I doubt it is or anything,” she had added the second part in precipitation when she saw the glare she got,” I did kind of deserve it”

“Still it was unprofessional, but try to imagine knowing that a brat just got in possession of a thing that could very well kill you and your whole city and start playing with it, with you knowing but unable to act. It’s quite the frustrating experience.”

After a slight pause, she continued talking, with her tone now perfectly composed.

“Well, I didn’t take you here just to shout on you. The real reason is that we could use your help and you will need our help. You may not feel it right know, but your body isn’t totally stable. It will hold for a long time, but in the end it is going to slowly degrade and in something like ten turns it will collapse.”

Reig had said that in such a casual tone that it took Liliei a few seconds to process them. Then Liliei felt her heart sink. Did that woman just told her she was going to die in ten turns? She wanted to think the Receptionist had lied, but that was just escaping reality. But, there must be something, right? There had to be something she could do, right? She sat straight and looked at the woman in front of her.

“What do you mean, can’t I do something about it. There must be something I can do to prevent it right? Right?”, her voice sounded just a little hysterical, but she didn’t care.

“Yes there is. Do you know what a Personal Quest is?” At the look the girl sent her, Reig continued, “A Quest is usually a request from one person to another, or from the World to a person, a Personal Quest is from a person to the World. They are usually asked by High Leveled Adventurers that get to a bottleneck with their Ability, and ask the World to give them help to go further. The World will then create a Quest that will help them, and once their initial objective is done, they must pay an offering to the World.”

Liliei was listening intently, she didn’t know how it was related to her problem and could barely prevent herself from lashing out at the Receptionist, but she didn’t want to miss an important detail. Meanwhile the woman continued her explanation.

“However, it is less known but you can ask for quite a lot of thing, such as a method to prevent your death. It has the advantage that, even if the World stand neutral on any conflict, the Rules are just a tiny bit lighter on Personal Quests, allowing us to give you information we couldn’t usually. ”

While the solution proposed to her seemed appealing, Liliei had a doubt.

“Is there any other way to save myself?”

“Yes, there are also three other ways. First you can try to find a soul mage to help you fix yourself, however there is only one alive at the moment and far less powerful than you’ll need. Second you can try to increase your Ability and Level enough that you’ll be able to fix yourself, but you’ll have to get at least to an Ability Level of 25 to be able to do that. The problem comes from the moment your soul passed from your old body to the new one while creating it. It did it instinctively and made a tiny error, which completely garbled your soul and your core. Undoing that while creating a new body and core and transferring will be pretty much impossible for you.

Finally you could try to find the information that the World would give you by yourself, but these are quite secret, and it would take a lot of time to get them, Possibly more than you have.”

Liliei thought about it. It was an important decision, but wasn’t the right path already traced? If what she just heard was true, her only chance at survival was to take a Personal Quest, and from what she knew, the Receptionists never lied. Ability Level 25 was a huge joke – the highest she ever heard of was Level 17 and it was a legend –, a soul mage was simply not possible, and looking by herself would take too long since she had no idea where to start from.

“Then I would like to take a Personal Quest.”

At her words a large smile bloomed on the face of the woman and she got on her feet in barely a second.

“Alright, first you will need a Guild Card,” she said and with a small movement of her hand a blue rectangle appeared between her fingers, and Liliei stood to catch it. She gingerly took it and immediately a large part of her status appeared on the card.

“Congratulation, you are now a member of the Adventurer’s Guild. You can hide anything on your Card at will, but cannot make it say something wrong. If you don’t need it at the moment just think so and it will disappear, only to come back when you need it again. Now onto the serious things. Answer honestly because it may affect what is given to you.

Sync.”

The moment the last word left her mouth, The Receptionist’s eye became luminous, and small distortions started appearing on her body. When she spoke, her voice was mechanical, empty, making Liliei shiver.

“Do you want to demand a Personal Quest?”

“Yes”

“What is your objective?”

At that she thought for a few second before talking, using the same terms that had been told her before.

“Finding a way to prevent my body from collapsing.”

“Are you willing to pay the tribute?”

This question brought her pause, but after a small reflexion she reminded herself she was dealing with the World. No matter what it asked, if would be fair in relation to what she would get.

“Yes.”

“Analysis…Done”

Instantly a flood of information filled her brain. To do that she would need an old artifact that would allow her to repair herself correctly. The artifact was also the tribute – it was stated with a strange wording but it was rather obvious – but it was alright since she would only need it once. Finally and most importantly, the thing was located…

“I give up.”

“What! Why?”, Reig, that had the control of her body back was flabbergasted at Liliei’s reaction.

“There’s no way I can obtain this! It’s in the Elerilen Family’s Vault. They are the closest equivalent to a Royal Family for the Elves. The will never trade something from their treasure, and stealing it is a hundred times over my capability. I’ll make better use of my time than running after an impossible task.”, Liliei spat her words as she turned to leave.

“Wait!”

Liliei, who had been about to storm out of the room, stopped in her tracks. Not because she wanted, but because a strong force opposed her movements. It took only half a second for the Receptionist to notice she had used her power and cancel it, but it was enough.

“Sorry, I didn’t...”

“Bye!” Liliei snarled at Reig, not even looking back as she stormed out.

She didn’t have to go through the hall as the door opened directly on the street. She immediately went for a small alley and left the crowd behind. She wandered the streets for a moment, hesitating on what to do. It was strange, she should feel sad, devastated or even angry, but there was nothing, just a sort of emotional void. She erred in the streets until finally she decided to go back to her house. Once there she just laid down on her bed for a moment before sleep took her.